I'm a new meneber and I felt I just had to log in and correct some misconceptions I've been reading on here.

first one, Typhoon is lacking in A2A ability because it has no thrust vectoring, is too expensive and/or not stealthy.

I've read these accusations on here in several threads and I must say I'm surprised that no-one appears to have challenged them! (Sorry if I missed it!)

First point first, thrust vectoring is nothing to do with the aircraft but everything to do with the engine, a TVC EJ200 has already been bench run for many hours, admittedly this is a programme afterthought, and this engine is intended for fitment to later production examples (Typhoon F3), naturally it would be retrofitted to existing Typhoons (making them F2A's)at a major service interval, as so many mods are applied this way. Secondly unit cost of the Typhoon including R&D is a fraction of the unit cost of even a stripped out 'export' F/A 22. This is a fact as the MOD seriously considered this option when the whole Eurofighter project looked to be in danger of cancellation through German prevarication a decade ago. The shock realisation of this is what made the UK pull out all the stops to keep the programme running. The bottom line was that the marginal superiority, where it existed, of the less capable 'export' F/A 22 could not be justified by the huge unit price, comparison with this and other aircraft (including the latest Flanker at the time,) showed that in fact, contrary to most popular opinion the Eurofighter offered the single most cost effective solution overall, which was a shock to the Germans as well as the MOD!
Now stealth, while clearly not in the same league as any of the major US programmes of recent years in this respect Low Observable Design Objectives WERE a major factor in the aircrafts design and the end result is not evidence that such technologies are lacking in Europe but rather evidence of the level of importance these attributes hold withing the Typhoons overall operational sphere. While the offensive role, which Typhoon will also carry out might demand more stealthiness than the aircraft enjoys, stealths overall importance in the Typhoons primary A2A mission in European skies is much less marked, hence a more relaxed attitude to it in this programme. There are many low observable technologies within the airframe but the sole really visible one is in the intake geometry, and even that is not obviously 'stealthy'. Of course a more stealthy design would also have been more expensive but it was felt that this additional cost could not be justified in the European environment. It is entirely possible that this belief is plain wrong but that is not a fault of the aircraft.

Typhoon is almost so expensive as F-22, so I highly doubt we will see some big improvements like TVC in the future. Currently it doesn't even have air-ground attack capability, it need to be solved first. Then the money is needed for Meteor long range missile development.
The most effective aircraft for export countries is still upgraded Su-35 Flanker with western radar and avionics.

you might well be right about the Su 35, it wasn't available when the evaluation was carried out and the MOD was looking at an older Flanker.

Unit cost of the Typhoon is £50-60m while unit cost of a Raptor is well over £100m, this isn't 'almost as expensive', its half. You are quite right about air to surface capability but as I said, air to air is the priority and its quite normal for an aircrafts secondary role to be added aftterwards, this isn't a problem, its normal procedure with a new programme. TVC on the type isn'yt my whimsical fancy, its a fact and a lot of money has been spent on developing the TVC variant of the engine by the partner nations. I don't understand why you find it so difficult to accept? The type is scheduled to be in service for 25 years and there will be many upgrades along the way, TVC is the first major one and a test bed will fly in the next few years.

BTW, if Typhoon WAS almost as expensive as F-22 then the British Govt, never mind the Germans, would have pulled the plug long ago. Sadly, preserving jobs and maintaining high technology industry wouldn't have come into it. Witness the TSR2, the most advanced strike aircraft in the world, almost twice as fast as the Buccaneer and F-111 at low level and faster than the F-111 at high and medium altitudes with greater payload and range was still scrapped purely on grounds of cost with not just all the prototypes virtually built but also the first 40 production aircraft in various stages of construction. Thats Britain, no long term overview just 'its too expensive BANG its gone, just like that.

Originally posted by waynos
you might well be right about the Su 35, it wasn't available when the evaluation was carried out and the MOD was looking at an older Flanker.

Unit cost of the Typhoon is £50-60m while unit cost of a Raptor is well over £100m, this isn't 'almost as expensive', its half. You are quite right about air to surface capability but as I said, air to air is the priority and its quite normal for an aircrafts secondary role to be added aftterwards, this isn't a problem, its normal procedure with a new programme. TVC on the type isn'yt my whimsical fancy, its a fact and a lot of money has been spent on developing the TVC variant of the engine by the partner nations. I don't understand why you find it so difficult to accept? The type is scheduled to be in service for 25 years and there will be many upgrades along the way, TVC is the first major one and a test bed will fly in the next few years.

BTW, if Typhoon WAS almost as expensive as F-22 then the British Govt, never mind the Germans, would have pulled the plug long ago. Sadly, preserving jobs and maintaining high technology industry wouldn't have come into it. Witness the TSR2, the most advanced strike aircraft in the world, almost twice as fast as the Buccaneer and F-111 at low level and faster than the F-111 at high and medium altitudes with greater payload and range was still scrapped purely on grounds of cost with not just all the prototypes virtually built but also the first 40 production aircraft in various stages of construction. Thats Britain, no long term overview just 'its too expensive BANG its gone, just like that.

Actually most of the Raptor's costs are R&D included. The unit replacement cost is around 100 mil. $. When more Raptors are produced (and I think they will be) the single unit cost will be only slightly higher than Eurofighter.

I'm afraid I don't actually know ho many F-22's are planned at the moment, and no doubt further procurement will dribble through down the years but at the moment there are *supposed* to be about 600 Typhoons built, without exports. I know I could be very wrong but I doubt there will be many more F-22s than that. The F-22 is hugely expensive but for a country like the US which likes upsetting people its clearly worth the expense

The going price for an EF-2000 is about US$60 million, if I recall correctly. The latest (worst-case) estimates put the F-22 at around $300 million. Total procurement requirements for the F-22 stands at about 217 at the moment.

Originally posted by Lampyridae
The going price for an EF-2000 is about US$60 million, if I recall correctly. The latest (worst-case) estimates put the F-22 at around $300 million. Total procurement requirements for the F-22 stands at about 217 at the moment.

You reacall wrong . The F-22 price includes R&D, spare parts, training, pst development (EMP weapon, new Amraam misiles etc.)simply everything of the project. (remeber that many of this money have been used for JSF R&D because JSF is actually 1 engine F-22) The single F-22 costs 92 mil. dollars (globalsecurity.org).
If you would count the Eurofighter price in the same way you will recieve very high price. The UK plans to buy over 232 EF aircrafts and THE WHOLE PROJECT for UK costs £38.3bn (BBC says) it is about 65 bilion $. The whole F-22 budget is 69 billion $ for 200 aircrafts.(as stated above it's everything in there).
So If you can count you can easily count the price for each aircraft and compare it. Eurofighter is only slightly cheaper than F-22, period.

Yes that with 32 bilion was false, my fault. I found an article on BBC,where the Eurofighter cost is criticized due to budget overuns, but the number shown was actually whole MoD budget for 2003 not the EF budget. Sorry. I am ashamed.

[Edited on 31-5-2004 by longbow]

Originally posted by Lampyridae

England is not the only one procuring the EF2000.

do not call the UK england ever again
it is racist to call it that

Originally posted by longbow
Yes that with 32 bilion was false, my fault. I found an article on BBC,where the Eurofighter cost is criticized due to budget overuns, but the number shown was actually whole MoD budget for 2003 not the EF budget. Sorry. I am ashamed.

[Edited on 31-5-2004 by longbow]

Nobody's perfect, mate! I've made plenty of my own blunders too. But yes, the EF2000 is bogged down with bureaucracy, mismanagement and all sorts of problems. No white knight project is it.